​US Army veteran arrested after saving distressed dog from hot car

What some may regard as a noble or even heroic action landed an Iraq war veteran in jail. Michael Hammons was arrested in Georgia and charged with criminal trespassing after breaking the glass of a hot car to free a panting pet.

Witnesses who saw the
man save the dog say they had actually noticed the canine inside
the hot Ford Mustang before Hammons ever came on the scene. But,
whilst they were waiting for the police, the Desert Storm veteran
decided to take action.

"He says we can't let this dog die, and he starts smashing
the windows," said Diane Byard, one of the shoppers as cited
by 11Alive.

Hammons reportedly used his wife's wheelchair leg to smash the
window and free the dog.

"I've got PTSD, and I've seen enough death and
destruction," he said. "And I didn't want anything else
to happen if I could prevent it."

But the Mustang owner did not see this as an act of good will.
According to witnesses, when she came out of the store and saw
the damage done to her car, she became furious and demanded
deputies take action and arrest Hammons.

"We didn't want to charge him, but he told us he broke the
windows and when you have a victim there saying she wants him
charged, we had no other choice," said Oconee County Chief
Deputy Lee Weems.

The car owner also insisted that she was only gone for a few
minutes, but Byard, who was on the scene, denies this: "It
wasn't just five minutes like the lady stated, it was a lot
longer," she said. "I personally felt the heat in the
car; I saw the dog panting. This dog was in distress.”

"If it is 80 degrees outside, within 30 minutes, it will be
114 degrees inside a vehicle, even with the windows
cracked," she added.

Though the car owner was cited for leaving the dog in the hot
car, the deputies say that it is difficult for them to establish
how long the dog was left in the car because they have no
surveillance video.

Animal advocates say they are working on trying to change the law
in Georgia, which currently allows an individual to break a
window to save a child in a hot or cold car, but not an animal.

"Anytime you put anything that's alive in a hot car with the
windows up, it should be against the law, and people should be
able to do what they need to do to help," animal rights
advocate, Shane Smith told WGXA TV.

Smith believes that Hammons should be rewarded for his action,
not penalized.

But Hammons, despite having been arrested and most probably
having to pay for the damage done to the car, says he would do it
all again.

"I knew there'd be consequences, but it didn't matter,"
Hammons said. "Glass, they make new glass every day, but they
could never replace that dog."